Board of Regents Meeting

[SF_Rabbit_Fan]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

Its a secretary job that probably makes less then $13 an hour, and with the secretary the guys with PHD's are allowed to focus either on teaching or research (making the university money)

As far as minors being deleted, my guess is they were probably created when the university was much smaller, classes were smaller and so on. They probably consist of most of the classes being offered anyways and with a few select ones they would offer once every 2 years. Even with that they wouldn't have the class if that few of students were taking a class. Generally 8 are needed to keep a class for those small upper level classes.

People can debate the public-private mantra until pigs fly and cows talk. However I continue to remind people that they have a different objective, the private business is to make money, public is to provide a service. Now that doesn't mean they should spend money like Pacman Jones at a strip club but it does mean that in the end of things they should remember what the point of it is (to provide an education).

As far as students not being prepared I agree 120%, but I don't know if thats the universities fault.

If it is truly that crucial to have someone there to make copies for profs, and they are so overworked making the university money, why not hire some workstudy kids at $8 an hour. They could probably use the money to pay for their rising tuition. That's what efficiency would look like where I work.

[SDSUAlum08]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

If it is truly that crucial to have someone there to make copies for profs, and they are so overworked making the university money, why not hire some workstudy kids at $8 an hour. They could probably use the money to pay for their rising tuition. That's what efficiency would look like where I work.

They do.

[joeboo22]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

If I'm not mistaken work-study is federal while other employees are FTE's and therefore state employees. Yes their is places to cut on a university but I don't know if secretaries are the place to cut.

There are many work-study students who do secretary jobs however since they are dependent upon a schedule and can only work so many hours generally there is 1 full-time secretary. I'd be willing to guess that there is not a ton of secretaries at the State universities.

[zooropa]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

extremely efficient

Where's the inefficiency? How does offering a minor with a low take-rate interfere with the efficient delivery of mainline courses? Where exactly does the 'inefficiency' appear in the system?

Should we only offer classes if they can be taught at the ratio of 1 TA to 300 students? Because that's more efficient than a tenured professor teaching 8 seniors, or 6 grad students.

I'm talking efficiency vs inefficiency.

Tenured prof making $60k per year.
Secretary making $25k per year.

Who should be performing clerical work? The secretary generates no revenue for the department. Professors generate revenue.

[zooropa]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

That's what efficiency would look like where I work.

And where do you work?

From where I sit, it's all about whose ox is being gored. Why don't you tell us where you work, because odds are, there are plenty of faults there where you work in the alleged 'real world.'

[JimmyJack]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

I am sick of this notion that private enterprise is so streamlined and efficient and that government should be ran like a business with business-type accountability. This line of reasoning is beyond specious. Private enterprise-----yeah, awesome. What should we talk about? The graft, kickbacks and corruption endemic among government contractors? The inefficiency of union labor? The banking crisis? The atrocious working conditions of Asian laborers? Do you, in short, really want to put private enterprise on some holy pedestal? Because, son, it doesn't stand any closer scrutiny than the government.

This.

[SF_Rabbit_Fan]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

And where do you work?

From where I sit, it's all about whose ox is being gored. Why don't you tell us where you work, because odds are, there are plenty of faults there where you work in the alleged 'real world.'

This is fair. Every organization has its problems. However, every organization isn't funded in large part from public dollars. And every organization can't just raise prices when a revenue stream gets slow.

I'm not trying to start a fight over private businesses and public entities, although a few of my posts did. Sorry about that, I'm more trying to use my personal experience to provide analogies than to say one system is better than another and I got carried away.

With that being said, if you can't see the absurdity of offering classes, minors, or majors that nobody takes, there isn't anything I can say to convince you. IMO, most people in South Dakota would find that absurd and inefficient.

I talked to several people who saw that Argus Leader article yesterday (both SDSU supporters and non, people bring up anything SDSU whenever they see me because they know I'm a fanatic), and the best reaction I got was laughter at a college offering programs that nobody took. The worst reaction was anger along the lines of "I have a hard time feeling sorry about their 10% cuts when I see stuff like this."

IMO, you can't say a university is being run 100% efficiently when secretaries are doing jobs that could easily be added to professor duties and a dozen courses are offered that don't have any interest. Small costs do add up when there are enough of them.

[Nidaros]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

Would one of these minors be in accounting? Just curious, if they cut that we are going to have a lot of stupid decisions made in the future.

BTW were can we find a list of these 15 minors that are on the chopping block? I think its presumptious to make blanket statements without knowing what these minors are, and what their orginal purpose was when instituted into the that specific dept.

[SF_Rabbit_Fan]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

Tenured prof making $60k per year.
Secretary making $25k per year.

Who should be performing clerical work? The secretary generates no revenue for the department. Professors generate revenue.

SDSU should just hire some more professors then. Since professors generate revenue, money problems solved, right? LOL

[SF_Rabbit_Fan]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

Would one of these minors be in accounting? Just curious, if they cut that we are going to have a lot of stupid decisions made in the future.

BTW were can we find a list of these 15 minors that are on the chopping block? I think its presumptious to make blanket statements without knowing what these minors are, and what their orginal purpose was when instituted into the that specific dept.

Haha, since nobody has taken these minors for the last 5 years, if one of them is accounting we are probably already in trouble.

I too would love to see a list of the 15 minors that were cut.

[JimmyJack]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

South Dakota, by any measure, spends LESS on education than almost any other state. If you believe the world stops at the S.D. border, then we're on the right track. Unfortunately, the rest of the world is going to continue to lap us and our kids won't be as successful out there as we would like. I'd prefer not to continue our race to the bottom in everything. We ARE among the national leaders... in ranking 51st.

There is tremendous hostility in this state to education (as evidenced by some people in this thread who seem to like SDSU athletics but assume SDSU faculty are lazy bloodsuckers.) I don't get it. Education is the only way we're going to move our state forward. You know what? Companies looking to relocate care a little bit about taxes. They care a lot about quality of life and availability of a well-educated workforce. Universities contribute to those things.

[Nidaros]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

South Dakota, by any measure, spends LESS on education than almost any other state. If you believe the world stops at the S.D. border, then we're on the right track. Unfortunately, the rest of the world is going to continue to lap us and our kids won't be as successful out there as we would like. I'd prefer not to continue our race to the bottom in everything. We ARE among the national leaders... in ranking 51st.

There is tremendous hostility in this state to education (as evidenced by some people in this thread who seem to like SDSU athletics but assume SDSU faculty are lazy bloodsuckers.) I don't get it. Education is the only way we're going to move our state forward. You know what? Companies looking to relocate care a little bit about taxes. They care a lot about quality of life and availability of a well-educated workforce. Universities contribute to those things.

SF Jack does not speak for everyone. I believe you and your collegues are indeed working very hard to provide suitable candidates for good jobs. There is nothing that suggest slothfulness at SDSU. Most from other parts of the country have this past year wondered why they stayed this long at SDSU. The anti-educational and anti-intellectual attitude is one of many termed by a former English Professor, Henry Henck, at SDSU who upon his departure described to the Collegian that South Dakota has a Stuck in the Mud attitude . He was moving on to Drake. This happened in 1964 so not much has changed. Professor Henck rightfully flunked me for preparing "slovenly written" papers in his class. I admire him for his honesty and my writing skills did improve to a minmum degree and I am still learning.

[RabbitObsessed]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

I cannot begin to fathom how courses that graduate less than 20 people over a a five year period should have been introduced in the first place.

How many programs graduate 10 or less students per year? They should probably get the ax.

I'm going to go on a bit of a rant here, please forgive me.

A relative of mine is a secretary for one of the departments at SDSU. Do you know what she does all day? She answer phones, makes copies, and create spreadsheets for professors. People with PhD's. People who should be able to create their own spreadsheets, make their own copies, and answer their own phones.

I work a decent job and have been fortunate to get to know executives at companies most posters on this board would recognize. Do you know how many of them have secretaries? None. They have voicemail. They have computers and copiers and have learned how to use them. I have coworkers who make about what professors make. Do you know how many of them have secretaries? None. They have voicemail. They have computers and copiers and have learned how to use them.

My relative is one of those who may lose their job due to cuts. It sucks, and I feel for them. But part of me says, how the heck have they had this job for so long when everybody else in the world has to answer their own phones, run their own copies, and learn how to use a computer. Maybe that makes me a bad person.

The world has changed, and there are plenty of areas where I see universities not keeping up with the curve.

The place I work has also had the misfortune of hiring some recent college graduates. It is a small sample size, but I am not impressed at all with the quality of individuals universities are turning out these days. They spend company time on facebook and sending texts. Some have had to be let go because they don't know how to work, don't know how or want to learn, and don't have any skills necessary to compete. They have college degrees and do not have any marketable job skills in a modern economy. They complain about their wages and complain when given more responsibility (read opportunity in the private sector).

So yeah, I'm frustrated by the university system's attitude of entitlement, how much it costs, and the quality of product it turns out.

End of rant.

I'm a little confused. You say that the people your place of work hires are not prepared for the business world. And you think this would somehow improve if LESS money is spent on education?

[joeboo22]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

Until someone can explain to me why its inefficient to "offer" a minor I'm not going to buy that its a big drag on the system. The state universities already have a policy if not enough people enroll in a class they don't teach it. If its a small class they generally only teach it once every 2 years as well. Its not like they were offering all the classes for all the minors every semester even if only 2-3 kids were in it.

As far as secretaries, its seems like we are never going to persuade you on this decision. In my experience its not like its 1 secretary for 1 professor. Other then the field-experience guy and College of Ed chair every other secretary has 10-15 professors under them. And the only reason the College of Ed have secretaries is because those professors are teaching classes, going out to the field, going to meetings at the same time students need answers.

Could some professors maybe pick up a little slack? Yeah they could but most secretaries do A LOT more then just make copies, get coffee and chat all day. And cutting them would hurt the students.

[LakeJack]

Re: Board of Regents Meeting

SF where do you work, I am interested?